Police are mounting a major operation at a supermarket in Berlin’s southern Marienfelde neighbourhood after a hostage-taking on Friday evening.
A man took a woman hostage and threatened her on Friday shortly after 10 pm (2000 GMT), police said.
“At the moment he is still inside the store and we are now on site with forces here and the operation is still ongoing,” police spokesman Stefan Petersen-Schümann told dpa early on Saturday morning.
Police are in contact with the man, but so far the motive has not been revealed.
The area around the supermarket, belonging to the Rewe chain, on Hildburghauser Strasse near the city’s southern edge has been cordoned off, according to a dpa reporter at the scene. Several supermarket employees were seen standing behind the police cordon.
One employee who had been working on Friday evening described the incident to journalists, saying he had been trying to clear the supermarket before closing time when a man pulled out a “very big” knife.
“I didn’t see much; it all happened very quickly. You couldn’t make much out either,” the 22-year-old said.
The man, a part-time worker at the branch, said he ran out of the supermarket with another member of staff and called the police.
He said the woman being held is a member of staff and that she “was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“I hope everything is all right, that she isn’t hurt, that it all ends well,” he added.
When asked by dpa, the police neither confirmed nor denied the man’s account.
“The operation here is still ongoing, so for the moment we cannot say more,” the spokesman said.